Artist, maker, teacher, author, head cook and bottlewasher.
Sign up here for monthly newsletters from me!
The art I make is the result of a life-long love of pattern, texture and color. How I teach is a skill honed by experience (I started teaching creative arts to younger kids when I was 12). After earning a B.A. in Studio Arts from Trinity University, I helped lead an internationally recognized educational foundation, designed curriculum exhibits for schools and other institutions, wrote and edited for a major daily newspaper, opened the San Antonio Children's Museum and then, a dozen years ago, took the scary but essential (for me) leap to become a fulltime artist and art teacher.
This weblog is about the maker's life. The teacher's path. The stitching and dyeing and printing of the craft of art cloth and art quilt. The stumbling around and the soaring, the way the words and the pictures come together. Poetry on the page and in the piecing of bright scraps together. The inner work and the outer journeys to and from. Practicalities and flights of fancy and fearful grandeur, trivial pursuits and tactile amusements. Expect new postings two or three times a week, unless you hear otherwise.
To reach me, leave a comment after a post, OR email me at susiemonday@gmail.com
To receive a notice of new posts in your email, scroll down this column to the end of the page and subscribe via FEEDBLITZ or add this blog to your own subscription service. You can search the blog with any phrase or word, by typing it into the seach window below:
We are in the middle of serious drought here, no rain to speak of for months.
I added my voice (visually) today, as I started work on a series of Rain Dances. These are a couple of in-progress photos as the day and the ideas developed. This piece is in the vein of a couple of large textile paintings I did several years ago for an exhibit at the Martin Museum of Art at Baylor University. As you can see, I work on a large table rather than a design wall -- I want to be able to put down as many layers of image as I need to and pinning to a wall is just too time consuming. Thus, I stand on a foot stool (or climb an 8 ft ladder) and take a photo when I need to get a better distance view. Works for me!
This one is going to be called Pond Prayer, I think.
Here's a little bit of ethnographic info from Wikipedia:
Julia M. Butree (a wife of Ernest Thompson Seton) in her book,[2] among other Native American dances, describes the "Rain Dance of Zuni."[3] Feathers and turquoise (or any sort of blue shade) are worn during the ceremony to symbolize wind and rain respectively. Many oral traditions of the Rain Dance have been passed down[4] In an early sort ofmeteorology, Native Americans in the midwestern parts of the modern United States often tracked and followed known weather patterns while offering to perform a rain dance for settlers in return for trade items. This is best documented among Osage and Quapaw Indian tribes of Missouri and Arkansas.
I also found this line beautiful prayer for rain from the Sehardic Jewish tradition:
"So open, we pray, Thy goodly treasury of rain, to revive all in whom a soul is breathed, as Thou makest the wind to blow and the rain to fall."
I am expecting this to become a series of ongoing pieces ... I have been searching for a theme that had real meaning to me, and right now, this prayer is that, this dance is that. For all of us in the drought and all of us in the floods, let's have our blessings reversed!
Last month I submitted a piece for Lesley Riley's upcoming book of illustrated quotes. I was actually assigned a quotation from Lesley. That made it difficult to slack off and forget the assignment, let me tell you...
I ended up making two versions of my quote and sent them in. Sometime soon, we submittees will know the results, and sometime a little later, you'll have the opportunity to purchase the book, filled with ideas on how to use words of wisdom to inspire pictures worth those few words.
I've often said that my creative genius (P.S. that's NOT ME, see the TED TALK below for what I mean) walks the tightrope between words and pictures. Both inform each other, and I'm not completely happy unless I am somehow honoring both in my creative life (waiting for said genius to blow through).
Lesley's newsletter is a great inspiration to my work, so if you're not a subscriber, read this issue and see what you think!
And for more from TED on ideas, see this PLAY LIST at http://www.ted.com/playlists/20/where_do_ideas_come_from.html
I polled other artists about their unsticking strategies and what a flurry of responses! I love all these ideas and comments. Thanks to you all and anyone else whom I missed on this roundup -- I'll keep adding. This is starting to look like a great article.
Michele Lasker says:
I have been watching the multitude of DVDs I bought from Interweave and Double Trouble for inspiration and it seems to be working. It's hard to get going after the holidays.
I find that when I get stuck it's typically because there's been an interruption in my normal flow of work. usually it's because I just finished a major project (a typical project for me takes eight months to a year, so finishing one is a Very Big Deal) and need some time to get my head unwrapped from the project - there's a bit of a grieving process as I come to terms with the end of my (working) relationship with the piece, and I usually feel pretty emotionally drained by the time I finish.
(1) Embrace boredom. That sounds really bizarre, but I've found that when my Muse has fled, it's because she needs a vacation. So I accept that I'm going to be bored and relatively unmotivated for a couple ofdays - it's part of the natural creative cycle for me. So instead of kicking myself about it, I let myself wander aimlessly about for a few days. Read books, clean up the kitchen, etc. I loathe being bored, but sometimes I need "time off" to recharge. In my experience trying to jumpstart faster doesn't work and just gets me more frustrated.
(2) Once I start feeling intensely bored (as opposed to bored and depressed), I start flipping through my idea notebook (mine is online, but they can be physical too), books on technique, books of swatches from sample exchanges, etc. I think of it as "teasing the Muse" - if you roll enough balls of tinfoil past a young cat, sooner or later its tail is going to start twitching and it will pounce. I figure the idea notebook and other idea sources make great balls of tinfoil for my Muse, so I simply parade ideas past her until something catches her/my fancy.
And after that, it's off again!
Barb Hilts says:
Me, I clean, which I do after every big project, Christmas included. Cleaning, puts things in order for another project. Out of the cleaning, ideas resurface.
Creative blocks are a period of growth. A dear friend of mine would suggest to work through the blocks in any creative medium, and your new path will emerge.
I watch DVDs of other artists and try to use that time to go to Art Institute or somewhere like that. The Art 21 series on PBS is wonderful. I think there are 7 seasons worth of those with interviews and videos of artists in all kinds of mediums. It's a great way to see a variety of things and get out of your head for awhile.
And then I clean the studio which always leads to something.
And Lisa Kerpoe chimes in from nearby:
Ha! We're thinking along the same lines. I just did a blog on creativity blocks and was planning to follow up next week with ways to overcome them! My favorite? I keep a drawer of unfinished items. Things that are fairly far along, but for some reason I just never finished them. I pull those out and start playing. That usually generates ideas that then work their way into other projects. Lisa Kerpoe lisa@lisakerpoe.com http://www.lisakerpoe.com http://lisakerpoe.blogspot.com
And from Rachel in Arizona
This helped me when I was in the grip of the "Oh but I can't do art because..." monster and it gets me out of places where I'm not making any art, and I don't know why. It has also helped with the times I've gotten stuck because everything I make looks godawful and fit only to line the cat box.
I read a book called Art and Fear, and it made me all indignant because in it somewhere it seemed to hint that I make a lot of excuses to avoid doing art. But but but my excuses are -- er my reasons, yeah that's it -- are all good exc-- reasons. I'm not feeling well! I'm feeling happy, so I should celebrate! I'm tired. I'm bored. I need to go to the store or I ought to clean the refrigerator. And on and on. And I began to have the sneaking suspicion that maybe I could somehow put all these important excuses aside for a little while and just make something.
That alone didn't quite get me going, but I think it opened me up so that when someone sent me a link to a Youtube of writer Neil Gaiman's commencement speech to the graduating class at an art college, and I heard the following, a light came on and I started looking at art as something I maybe could do anyway:
"Remember, whatever discipline you're in, whether you're a musician or a photographer, a fine artist or a cartoonist, a writer, a dancer, a singer, a designer, whatever you do, you have one thing that's unique: you have the ability to make art. And for me, and for so many of the people I've known, that's been a lifesaver, the ultimate lifesaver; it gets you through good times and it gets you through the other ones.
"Sometimes life is hard; things go wrong, in life and in love and in business and in friendship and in health and in all the other ways that life can go wrong. And when things get tough, this is what you should do: make good art. I'm serious. Husband runs off with a politician? Make good art. Leg crushed and then eaten by a mutated boa constrictor? Make good art. IRS on your trail? Make good art. Cat exploded? Make good art. Someone on the Internet thinks what you're doing is stupid or evil or it's all been done before? Make good art. Probably things will work out somehow; eventually time will take the sting away and it doesn't even matter. Do what only you can do best: make good art.
"Make it on the bad days. Make it on the good days too. And . . . while you're at it, make your art. Do the stuff that only you can do."
Or maybe it's just going back to that speech and listening to Neil reading that aloud. :) But sometimes a reminder of why I want to dye cloth is exactly what I need to sweep all the rubbish aside.
JC at Wellstrong Gallery suggests:
The best advice I've received for coping with writer's block is to write anything. Write a shopping list, a thank-you note, etc. Writing a journal is different, because that's a continuation. Journals do it for some people, but not me. It needs to be something new, and original (the shopping list has to be considered (in its nature) to work, e.g., if for food, for a new recipe, rather than milk, eggs, bread).
I do the same thing to get unstuck in the studio. I have what I call "mindless sewing projects". It could be an old project that has all of the conceptualizing done but needs finishing work (new and original isn't as important, because just handling the art gets me in an art frame of mind), or it could be a "crafts" project like a baby quilt. Or maybe it's prep work like dyeing etc. fabrics. Basically, working is working, and if I just keep working, things start to flow and the ideas and inspiration just come.
My biggest block is a cleaned up workspace. I try to leave something that's ready to just pick and get going on, either on my table, or in a milk crate ready to dump out. That way there isn't any of that breaking into a tidy space reluctance.
And from June Steegstra
I find reading through my books (I have an extensive library) and magazines gives me lots of ideas to addapt for my own. I usually have two or three projects that are waiting for me to begin.
Su Butler chimed in:
I remedied it by going to a meeting with people who do entirely different work that I do...I am primarily a weaver and dyer, but the people at the meeting were quilters, paper makers, felters, thread painters etc. It was terribly inspiring and really invigorated my creative senses. I am working on a piece entirely out of my usual medium and adjusting to the learning curve, but facing it with tremendous freedom because I honestly don't know what I am doing wrong....and that reminds me of how I need to feel when creating without my own "world"........ and I am feeling more and more creative as a result. I call this "shock therapy"....introduce something so new and unknown that only creativity can make it happen....even in my ideas are old hat to someone else, they are new to me and it is very helpful and satisfying.
Hope everyone can find a renewal of their creative freedom this year! www.subudesigns.com
Drawing in a new medium might be your inventive step. Think outside your usual constraints.
INVENTION!
The next step in making a study (see the past two posts for more information) is the big, fun one of actually doing something with all that brainstorming, experience and research. This is, of course, the point of it all. But even if you shortcircuit the PRIMING and just take one or two of my previous suggestions, you will end up with a much deeper, more resonant and powerful piece of work in the invention stage.
If you have the time and inclination -- and the deadline isn't looming -- here are some of the INVENTION exercises we use with kids, and that I use in my fiber arts creativity courses. These activities may not be exactly in your comfort zone, but that's the point. Whatever textile art (or other art) you create after playing in these ponds will be rich, rich, rich.
INVENTION
After the priming experiences, choose and play with materials in one or more of the following ways, and then express your own version or personal definition of the subject as uniquely as possible. You may have other suggestions or ideas for media or genres. This is just a wildman version of ways you can take your ideas!
Movement Play
Use some or all of your bodies and/or locomotion (movement from one spot to another) to explore the subject, and then create one or more of the following:
· Physical games
· Dances
· Pantomimes
· Dramas
· Improvisations
2-D Play
Use the subject to create one or more of the following:
· Drawings -- on canvas, paper and fabric
· Paintings -- on canvas, paper and fabric
· Collages -- fibric, mixed media, paper cloth
· Prints -- screen, stencils, stamps
· Art Quilts
Art Cloth
· Maps, graphs or diagrams
· Stories or poems related to your drawings
3-D Play
Use the subject to create one or more of the following:
· Puppets
· Masks
· Models
· Sculptures
· Constructions
· Stories, dramas, environments or exhibits related to your creations
Word Play
Generate words related to the subject and use the words to create:
· Stories (written or tape recorded)
· Poems
· Tongue twisters
· Monologues/dialogues
· Slogans
· Invented words and definitions
· Riddles
· Books or a library of books
Tech Play
Use technology to create with the subject, creating one or more of these:
· Slide shows of photographs
· Transparencies on the overhead projector
· Videos
· Animations
Digital books
Photos to print on fabric
If you'd like to have a guide through this process, and you live somewhere near San Antonio, consider taking my course at the Southwest School of Art. The first four weeks of the course will be devoted to Making a Study.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013 at 08:55PM 
